The Challenge: Design and build a car capable of crossing the vast and imposing continent of Australia using only sunlight as fuel and to prove it, in the spirit of friendly competition against others with the same goal.
This BLOG updates as teams publish their contributions around the world.

Disclaimer

Information on this blog is raw and sometimes unverified reporting straight from the road by teams. The event will issue a media release for any events requiring an official notification.

Note that links in blog entries are not maintained, so while a link may be verified to work on the day of publishing, this is not guaranteed beyond that day.

Monday, October 29, 2007

This is the final day of the Challenge, or would have been, if it hadn't been called due to weather yesterday, which it wasn't.

The story, it turns out, is that the police asked the WSC to take solar cars off the road while a severe weather warning was in effect, with the intent that they could return to solaring later if the weather improved. But by the time this trickled down to the teams on the road, the story had chinese-whispered to become the end of solaring. For those teams that got the message, anyway: some only heard when they reached the finish line.

The finish line: that's our final objective.

We walk from our backpackers', in the Adelaide CBD, down to Torrens Parade Ground, the logistics area for teams. We roll our car out of the trailer, and turn it on.

Predictably, it doesn't go.

The driver controls board is deader than usual: we flex it, to no avail, and so I am forced to resort to the soldering iron and a few mumbled incantations. It turns out that a combination of soldering and flexing resurrect the board from always-fail to usually-fail. We get a good boot and leave it alone.

Last time, the WSC provided a lead bus that held our crew and a follow vehicle to escort our car. This time they provide the bus again, but it's not a lead vehicle: it just ferries us up to the finish line at Victoria Square, leaving only our driver in the solar car and our team manager in the follow vehicle. This is clever because this way, if anything goes wrong with our car during the drive (which is up-hill), we'll be unable to deal with it, and the car will be left stuck in the right lane of city trafic.

Most of our radio comms are either flat (because we're in a backpackers' rather than our regular camp, so radios were not charged overnight), or vehicle mounted, and we're away from our vehicles. We've got comms between the solar car and the team manager in the follow vehicle, but no more. Our radios don't work on the WSC's radio channel, and theirs don't work on ours.

We arrive at the finish line.

We wait. Nothing happens.

We wait. Nothing happens.

We wait. We receive word that Willetton's car, Sungroper, has left the parade grounds. They're a bit of a special case: their car isn't running, so they're simply going to push it by hand. They have a police escort to help them not get run over while they do this.

We wait. Strobe lights appear a few traffic lights away. With each cycle of lights, they get one intersection closer, then they cross the line. All cheer.

We wait. We receive word that our car has left the parade grounds. Probably. It sounds like it's working. Probably.

Strobes appear in traffic, and after a smaller wait, because our car can move faster than a hand-pushed car, we cross the finish line. All cheer.

Cheering and celebrations are much more subdued than in my two previous Challenges, possibly because we have been kept waiting so long.

We hang around the square for a while, looking at other cars, which are on display in marquee tents. We cheer one other car as it crosses the line. Cars are arriving only very slowly, even though there are several cars waiting at the parade grounds to come in.

There is a solar boat race, with small boats made by school students, going on in the fountain. There is a solar car race, with small cars made by school students, going on on the other side of the square. Each car has an egg as driver.

It rains. All retreat to marquees.

We give up waiting for other solar cars to arrive, and return to the backpackers'.

And that's it: the Challenge is over. We completed, by our count, 1050km on solar power. In the evening we go to the awards ceremony, then a team dinner. The following day we pack, and wash our extremely dirty vehicles, and the day after that we're scheduled to return those vehicles and fly home.

What a sensational couple of days. After starting at 8 AM Thur, after waiting for other solar cars still under solar power, the Hammerhead headed from Alice. After a nervous start with the controller having a little hiccup on the start line the car starts to behave.

We cruise out of Alice a little tentatively but as the day progresses the car keeps going without showing any signs of fault. We have enough Telemetry to know what we are putting to the road but rely on the driver to relay current output from the array. We discover that on a good flat surface the car can travel at about 55kph on solar power alone. We are all pleased.

Toward the end of Thursday we have travelled approx 406km but batteries are low. We camp 45km north of Marla and charge the batteries. Willetton are just down the road but are having battery and array issues. They say they can manage about 70km per day. The Esteban team from Canada drop into the camp and we assist them to pump up tyres they too are having problems and say that they restarted from Alice too. I mention that we are ahead of them. The laugh and wish us well.

Friday morning a few of us drive to Marla to pump up the motor wheel. We can't get the bead to seat with our small pump. We head off 40 min late after serving a short time penalty for stopping late the previous evening.

The day progresses well, the car performs beautifully under the near perfect conditions. We targeted 275km to get to Coober Pedy. We have a forced half hour stop at Cadney Control stop and an unscheduled 18 min stop to change a tyre on the troopy and to repair the windscreen which was dislodged by the windblast from a large oncoming truck. Tom said the experience was interesting!

We pass Coober Pedy at 3PM and decide to drain the Batteries by going hard and then choosing to stop and charge. The car continues to travel exceptionally well and beyond expectations and we manage another 57 km beyond our Target Coober Pedy. We stop at 4:10pm and charge till dusk.

Meanwhile support has head for accommodation at Coober Pedy and when the car crew returns we head out for pizza which I highly recommend.

Targets reached:

Two Full days of Solaring.Ahead of 2005 total.Solaring complete distant between two control stops.

Today, after a long (or not so long) sleep-in for some, we learned that we would be staying in Alice Springs for yet another day, due to a bit of confusion with what time the team were allowed to leave. This enabled us to get some much needed rest, and carry out some much needed repairs on the car.

In the morning, after a delicious breakfast of beans on toast, and several rounds of "Chicken Train" (by 'Ozark Mountain Daredevils' in case you'd like to have a listen) we all headed out to Alice Springs Mall. All the students went their separate ways to buy gifts for family and friends and numerous CD's and Magazines, while Mr Morgan and Mr Sheppard visited yet another Woolworths. Some of the boys then decided to climb to the top of the monument, while the rest of us took the bus. This proved to be a very academically positive excursion, as we managed to spot 5 different fast-food stores from the top, all in the same area.

When we got back, Trent, both Andrews and I (Curtis) all decided to climb the mountains of the McDonnell ranges. They are only about 200m high, but that's still quite a climb, due to near-vertical slopes. We managed to climb up it and down it in less than an hour, and it was good fun. No one slipped, and we had an excellent view from the top. Luckily, we managed to catch the Observer on the radio, as we had such good reception. On the way down, it was a lot more fun. There were a lot of various slippery steep rocks, about 3m long. They all had long, wide steps underneath them, so we were able to use them as slides quite safely.

We all decided it was about time for a swim, where a number of the boys (Flegg) "tried" to chat up some innocent girls in the pool, and we created a 12 person bombie line. We managed to completely drench Tom and Laura who were outside of the pool, when Gracie decided to bombie right next to them. This resulted in a rushed last minute wash, as lots of articles of clothing were soaked.

After we got kicked out of the pool, by Miss Tauber, we all went back to the camp. A couple of people put the solar car back in the trailer and got us completely ready for tomorrow, while everyone else cooked dinner. A couple of us also got in a bit of trouble when we hit the tent of an American lady with a football; but apart from that, all was good. We also all had a last minute pack, with lots of articles of clothing being thrown, lost and buried in sand.

All in all, it was a day well deserved, if not predicted. We got a lot of work done, and had a chance to relax and unwind. We all got to know each other a little better, and it was a great to experience Alice Springs.

By Curtis Brand (Year 11) and Laura Pilsworth (Year 10)

Special thanks to Danyal Cowasjee (Year 10) for helping

Day 11. I think we can call it a complete success. I promised we'd do better, and we sure did. Today we covered 407km with the solar car, which is pretty much 4 times the amount we'd done on solar in the last week! Our total is sitting at 519km now, not far behind our previous record of 798km, which we set in the 2005 Sungroper car. The team is ecstatic and we couldn't have hoped for much more. This is just one step forward to our goal of driving the solar car from Alice Springs to Adelaide.

This morning was a fairly enjoyable one, although very hectic. We all got up by 6:30, but were beaten by the Annesley College girls, who were driving a Greenfleet car. Some of the guys were disappointed and rushed out to say goodbye. I'm not entirely sure if it is a joke for some people or not, which is one thing I am hoping someone will clarify EVENTUALLY.

On top of all this, it was a really enjoyable day. Our team was also happy when we not only physically passed Willetton, but passed them in solar kilometres. They spent a few hours on their trailer unfortunately, while we were going solar from early this morning to 5:04 this evening. Of course, we're also cheering for Willetton, as it's not only our old car, but they're also a fellow WA high school. We would like to beat them though.

The other major thing that went on today was when we crossed the border from Northern Territory and South Australia. Amazingly, no one jumped from one side to the other doing the whole "NT, SA, NT, SA" thing. It was good fun though. We also saw the exact middle of Australia, which is located very closely to the Stuart Highway. We all thought this was a great novelty and took a lot of photos. We'd upload some, but they're pretty much just photos of ground and the bush.

One of the geniuses on the camp (Me) decided that maybe people are missing their families and friends, so one of those geniuses (Me) decided that we could all write a little message for our families down the bottom. Look out for your message below.

Laura says, "Hi to Hilary, Graham and Claire, and to all the people who are supporting me."

Tom says, "Hi Mum!"

Susan says, "Hey to friends and family, and to Daniel. Also Happy Birthday for the 26th to Stuart, hope you have a great day. Miss you all!"

Danyal says, "Hello to family and friends from somewhere in the middle of nowhere. Excuse me, you're in my parking space."

Angela says, "Ni hao ma ma he ba ba! We're spending the second night camping on the side of the road. Hello to all my friends reading this as well ^______^ wo zhen de ai ni, jie jian!"

Candace says, "A big hello to all my family and friends out there reading this, I'm missing you all and look forward to seeing you again. Love you all!"

Kai says, "Hello to anyone who cares about me… I'm fine. See all of you guys soon!"

Trent says, "Hi Home, hi family, hi Dora." :D

Declan says, "Hey everyone at home! We are camping by the side of the road… in the middle of nowhere."

Morison says, "hi parents and harry I saw road kill I saw it first so I got it, so when I get home I want it cooked, I got me a gold sticker for chopping dis darn tree down im special."

Ryan says, "Hi to all my relatives in England and parents, Nathan, Daniel and sister"

Curtis E Bear says, "Hey to everyone back in Perth. Hope it's not too quiet without me. Can't wait to get back and I LOVE YOU SUB."

Cavenagh says, "hi mum and dad, hey grandma (if you are reading this) I hope you all miss me because I will be home next week (I better start walking now) P.S. hey mum can you print a copy for grandma?"

Gizele says "Hey everyone! Miss you all and hope to see you soon. Love you lots."

Rhys Says "Hi Everyone, hope you guys are having fun, cause we are over here."

I am Bob Culver, one of the faculty advisors of the team and I have just returned from Australia and would like to share some perspectives with you.

I often say that the Solar Car experience is a self-awareness or awakening of sorts, allowing students to find their own limits – what they can do and what they cannot do.Well, I was half right.This team was tested often.It started with a structural failure in the bulkhead just a few days before they were scheduled to leave for Australia.The team quickly analyzed and fixed the problem such that the resulting structure was stronger than ever.Then came the dust devil in Australia that almost destroyed the array that you have read about in the blog.And then, of course, was the accident.After a short period of shock and a few tears, the team began the arduous task of rebuilding the front end of Continuum.No one needed any inspirational speeches as everyone was working with determination and purpose as soon as the car was back to the Darwin racetrack.It was truly amazing and inspiring to see the car rebuilt and ready for racing in about 10 hours.This team responded to everything and anything that was thrown at them.So, pardon the double negative, the Continuum team never found out what they couldn’t do!

During the qualifying week, the Continuum team continued the Michigan tradition of helping other teams.The team let the Venezuela team borrow a motor when many of their parts got stuck in customs.And the team, with Chito’s help, built a new wheel hub for the Malaysian team after an accident during a qualifying run destroyed their only hub.What goes around, comes around.At the accident scene, a local Darwin gentleman happened by to see the damage.When he saw the damage, he said he had a friend who was an expert in carbon fiber composites.We called the expert, Mr. Mike Butler, and he joined us back at the racetrack pits.Mike brought with him some fast curing resin which turned out the be critical to getting the repairs done quickly.

A special thanks to all the sponsors of this team.You have enabled an experience of a lifetime for a very special group of kids.They may not have finished first, but this team is definitely a group of winners.

Sunday, October 28, 2007

The part for the battery safety system arrives. I solder it in. It works.

We have a new observer today: we traded out our last one at the checkpoint.

James from Tritium has given me some solder flux and some hints on resoldering fine surface-mount components. I reflow solder on the bits of the driver controls board that I've not yet tackled.

We get another new observer: another team have left the Alice Springs checkpoint without one, and WSC send a vehicle to our caravan park to take our observer to chase them down, and drop us off a temporary replacement.

We take the car for a flog around the Mac Donnel Ranges caravan park's little service roads. It works. The problem with the driver controls board fails to exhibit itself.

In the afternoon, John goes into the Alice Springs control stop. The entire control stop, much bigger than any other because of the externally-imposed requirement to hold cars here, continues to be a giant temple to Eris, goddess of chaos, confusion and discord. He's going in to check that we really will be held here until 5pm this afternoon (which is to say 8am tomorrow, because there's no solaring between 5pm and 8am). He finds that the control stop have changed their mind: another car that has trailered has already been allowed to leave. And they haven't told us, until we actively chased them down and asked them about it. He phones us, but we figure out that by the time we get the car in the trailer, to the check point and out of the trailer again, we'd get maybe 10 minutes of solaring before the end of the day. So we sit.

We get another trade-out of our observer. That's three we've had today; four since our team has moved at all.

Challenge Day 5: Thursday

We take our car back to the Alice Springs control stop, in preparation for our 8am start. Several teams are still camped here, Heliodet and Willetton among them. I chat with Willetton for a bit.

A few minutes before 8am, we're on the line. We turn the motor controller on. It doesn't go.

Damn.

All my reflowing of solder and test driving at the caravan park has been to no avail. We strap a couple of cable ties around it, restart it, and it goes.

We solar out of town, and onwards the whole day. We finish at what the route notes tell us is the turn-off to Granite Downs homestead, after 406km of solaring, with a dead flat battery. We do the dusk charge, facing the array to the setting sun.

Mysteriously, the driver controls (and the entire rest of the car) have given us no trouble whatsoever since we started rolling.

The local copper stops by and trades phone numbers with us, giving us his home number against the possibility of us running into trouble. We camp, in the exact geographic centre of nowhere.

Challenge Day 6: Friday

Dawn charge, and then out on the road. After a few hours, we solar into Cadney homestead to serve our half hour at the control stop. This is the first time the Leeming team has solared all the way from one control stop to another. There are several other teams here, including Heliodet and Queens.

The homestead roadhouse is flat out serving lunches to the teams coming through; we just manage to get our lunches within our 30 minute limit. As soon as we are released, we zip over to the free air to inflate our tyres. Steve crawls around under the vehicle -- the wheels have been assembled with the valves on the inside face, and so a certain amount of grovelling is necessary to get an air hose onto the valve.

We solar out. Further down the road we run into a problem: a road train with an unusually large profile goes past unusually fast, and the bottom edge of the windscreen blows in. The driver pushes it approximately back into place, and we are able to continue a short distance to find a suitable place to pull over to repair. When we pull over we discover that the lead vehicle has a flat tyre. Half of us pop the windscreen back into place and gaffer tape and screw it in position, and half of us change the tyre. 18 minutes later, we're going again.

We continue past Coober Pedy, with the battery mysteriously refusing to go flat. We score 327 solar kilometres for the day, do the dusk charge, and trailer back to Coober Pedy for the night.

We stay at the same underground backpackers we stayed at in 2005; we eat at the same pizza shop we ate at in 2005. At the next table are some German and Dutch guys; it turns out that we've seen them several times on the road. They're motorbiking south along the Stuart highway at vaguely the same average speed as us, and they've given us a wave each time they've passed.

Challenge Day 7: Saturday

The lead vehicle, with the solar car in the trailer, leaves early and heads back to the point we finished solaring last night, 56km south of Coober Pedy. We set up to charge, but it's cloudy and windy. We get about 0.8A coming in, a tenth or so of peak.

We set out with a heavy tail wind. This saves us some energy, but the car is difficult to position on the road, and there's a lot of dust whipping up. With the cloud, we're only getting about a quarter of full sun. Weather forecasts are for cloud, cloud, cloud, with rain and possible thunder further south.

For the first time we're forced to put people outside the car whenever we're stationary: if the wind catches the hammerhead front that we lift to get the driver in and out, then it will flip up and forward, and destroy our front array. We had a latch mechanism, but it was destroyed in shipping to Darwin. So we hold it down when stationary, and improvise a piece of rope that the driver sits on to keep it down when driving.

We "solar" as far as the Glendambo control stop, though there's not a lot of sun involved. The dust continues to blow up; at one point we lose sight of the lead vehicle a couple of hundred metres in front of us.

At Glendambo, we concede defeat: the sky is getting dustier and the cloud is unrelenting. At the end of our 30 minutes, we put the car in the trailer, and drive on fossil fuel to Port Augusta. By the side of the road, we see other teams coming to the same conclusion: U Chile, Heliodet, Solar Fox. Under a thousand kilometres of dust and cloud, there's nowhere to go.

At the Port Augusta control stop we are told that the Challenge has been called: the weather is too severe. Our observer, a local farmer, says he's never seen it worse.

We trailer to Port Pirie, seeking accomodation. Brown rain falls. Port Pirie is full, booked out by two weddings, so we trailer to Adelaide.

50km out, we come across the Willetton team pulled over: the draw bar on the Sungroper trailer has broken almost all the way through. We help them push it clear of the road, and loan them some tools. Phone and radio calls are made back and forth, and two Leeming staff who are meeting us in Adelaide find overnight accomodation for the Willetton team, to get them out of the storm.

We arrive, and do logistics. A new tram line has gone in in Adelaide, and the resulting string of "no right turn" signs mean that we take the very long way around to our accomodation. We're actually split across two backpackers: everywhere is full of solar car teams who got here before us. Nine of us stay at the first one, and the rest of us haul luggage a kilometre or so through the rain to the second one.

Saturday, October 27, 2007

The information shown here represents control stop data and shows which vehicles are passed through which control stop. This is not the official time keeping list as certified by our time keeper and does not take any penalties into account. This page does not reflect actual time travelled. Further more, it shows the official departure time of each vehicle from a control and may have data entry errors.

Adelaide

Nuon Solar Team at 2007-10-25 16:54:00

Umicore at 2007-10-26 09:13:00

Aurora Challenge at 2007-10-26 09:54:00

Ashiya University Solar Car Project at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

University of Michigan at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

FH Bochum Solar Car Team at 2007-10-26 11:52:00

National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences at 2007-10-26 11:59:00

The information shown here represents control stop data and shows which vehicles are passed through which control stop. This is not the official time keeping list as certified by our time keeper and does not take any penalties into account. This page does not reflect actual time travelled. Further more, it shows the official departure time of each vehicle from a control and may have data entry errors.

Adelaide

Nuon Solar Team at 2007-10-25 16:54:00

Umicore at 2007-10-26 09:13:00

Aurora Challenge at 2007-10-26 09:54:00

Ashiya University Solar Car Project at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

University of Michigan at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

FH Bochum Solar Car Team at 2007-10-26 11:52:00

National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences at 2007-10-26 11:59:00

Today was an especially exciting day for us because it was our first day testing Lissie sans electrics, so we could compare her petrol-only performance to her performance as a petrol/electric hybrid.

We're happy to say our little car achieved exactly what we wanted her to as a hybrid! Although the figures won't be confirmed until WSC officials announce the results on Sunday, we've calculated that Lissie uses just over 10 litres of petrol for every 100 kilometres when driven via petrol only whereas when she's switched petrol/electric hybrid mode she uses around 7 litres. That's a 30% reduction in petrol consumption. We're very proud!

Our team travelled approximately 550km from Coober Pedy (where we had time to visit the underground opal museum while we participated in the morning public display) to Port Augusta today, with only driver/navigator swap-over stops and a lunch stop. The roadhouse café staff must not have been informed the WSC would be cruising past because there was only one person in the kitchen. With much running around, she did a great job but I bet she'll sleep well tonight.

The landscape changed a fair bit today. The scenery on either side of the highway transformed from flat red earth with little vegetation to a browner coloured earth that was hilly in spots and quite shrubby, especially as we got close to Port Augusta. It was lovely to see some colour.

We had dinner out tonight, wandering into the city centre to eat at a local restaurant, where Meg Craven (the EOS Project surrogate mother) read out a letter written by a long time supporter of Annesley's EOS Project and we swapped stories about our amazing trip.

It is incredible to think our journey is almost over. It has flown by! We are only 298 kilometres from Adelaide, where we should cross our destination check point at around 12:30pm tomorrow and have our final fuel measurements taken.

At 2pm the Greenfleet vehicles will travel to Victoria Square in convoy with a police escort for the Ceremonial finish and public vehicle displays. Once that finishes at 4pm, we will spruce ourselves up for the Civil Reception, being held for all participants at 6pm in the Town Hall. Then, all Greenfleet Technology Class entrants will exhibit their vehicles at the Greenfleet Emerging Transport Technology Conference at Adelaide Convention Centre on 29 and 30 October.

The Panasonic World Solar Challenge has been an adventure of a lifetime in every respect. We are very grateful for the support of our major sponsors, Mortgage Choice and Holden, and for the wonderful efforts and advice of those who travelled with us. The 2007 team has become a close family and will never forget this experience we have been so fortunate to enjoy. Annesley looks forward to its next Challenge!

We have just left Port Augusta at 12:30 after a record three minute wheel change and are heading to Adelaide at 85km/hr which means we should reach the Adelaide control stop (20km out of the city on Princes Highway) by 3:45. We anticipate being held there for up to twenty minutes and then will head down Main North Road, through North Adelaide and follow King William Street to Victoria Square where all the cars will be on display for the weekend.

We woke to a gorgeous blue sky and a good charge on the battery this morning.

We passed another team on our way to the Port Augusta control stop.On the way we faced a very big hill, longer than the one we got stuck on the first day and almost as steep, but we had planned well and with a run up we were able to get over it easily and enjoy the long downhill run on the other side.Once again the car was able to cruise on the speed limit for long stretches.At the Port Augusta control stop we came in 14tht overall and while it is difficult at the moment to confirm our position, we are probably in the top ten of the adventure class solar cars.Unfortunately, we suffered a puncture just as we rolled to a stop under the direction of the marshal. The rules forbid working on the car during the control stop so after the 30 minute wait we had to roll the car out of the marshalling area and change the wheel.Because we were already safely stopped in a “good” place and had 30 minutes to think about it, it was changed in only a few minutes and we were underway again.Later in the afternoon we still had good sun and we had been running fast when we reached a long downhill stretch and used the regeneration feature again to put current back into the batteries. There was a problem however, when suddenly the car lost all power and coasted to a stop near the bottom of the hill.It quickly became apparent the system had shut down the motor to protect the batteries.Like all good technicians, the first thing we tried was turning it off and turning it on again and we soon had the car going again.At 5:08pm we arrived at a petrol station at the turn off to Redhill and were made welcome by the proprietor to camp for the evening.

Tomorrow, the final day, begins with bacon and egg sandwiches and coffee from the roadhouse. We expect to be arriving at the last control point at Virginia where official timing for the race ends. We will then proceed down Port Wakefield Road into the city and with luck and good sunshine we will arrive in Victoria Square about lunchtime.

This morning we had to change all four tyres after parking in a patch of bindis overnight. We pulled one bindi thorn out of a tyre and were rewarded with a loud hissing sound as the air came out at 100psi.

Today we travelled 581 km. This is the furthest Kelly has travelled in one day during this year’s event. Our average speed was 77 kph. In the afternoon the car cruised at 110kph for extended periods. We had a safe day as well, no more incidents.We had a control stop today at Cadney Park and as usual we took advantage of the sun while we were stationary to add charge to the batteries.As we had been averaging a higher speed, the team that arrived just before us were kind enough to let us go first from the control point.As it was, they were about 30 minutes in front of us anyway so it didn’t really make much difference to them and it was safer than passing on the road.In any case, they overtook us again a bit later on down the road, when we experienced delays due to problems with our radio communications.Problems with batteries in our portable radios meant that the vehicles in our team miscommunicated about a driver change and lost some time while the changeover was reorganised for a second location, although we did manage to keep the car on the road and rolling during the aborted stop.We finished up in a gigantic truck park on the side of the road 138 km North of Glendambo in the middle of nowhere with our evening brightly lit by the nearly full moon.While we waited for our chuck wagon team to make dinner we investigated the latest symptoms in an ongoing problem with our sophisticated electronics.We were pleased to discover that a loose wiring connection was causing a problem and when we removed the offending circuit board we discovered a number of severely cooked components.It was a real pleasure to sit in a large circle around a big campfire in the moonlit bush.After dinner we repaired the damage and swapped the circuit board for a spare one we had with us.

This morning we set out under clear blue skies for Alice Springs, still 194km down the road, the battery pack somewhat refreshed after collecting the afternoon and morning sun.

With good sun and energy in the batteries we sat on 60kph for the first hour until the sun was higher and then cranked Kelly up to 80kph. The last 20km into Alice was a steep down hill section, which gave us some experience using regeneration, where we use the motor to slow down the car and pump energy back into the battery pack.As we approached Alice Springs we were informed that our cruiser towing the gear trailer had rolled over 65 km north of Alice Springs. We were told that everyone was alive but we weren’t sure who was in the car or what injuries they had received.We arrived in Alice Springs just before 11:30am and discovered we would be held over until 2pm. We left the car to soak up the midday sun and to get a sigificant charge up on the batteries.As we waited we received more news about the accident and established one occupant was ok and another had some kind of injury. Both were being transported to hospital in an ambulance.Some of our gear turned up in one of the official’s cars but most of it was being picked up by the remaining support vehicles.After arranging all of the details for the damaged vehicles and filling out the paperwork, our manager visited the hospital to check on how our comrades were going.At 2pm we set off from Alice Springs with the battery two thirds full and decided to to make as much distance as possible.We drove quickly through the hills south of Alice Springs and progressed quickly during the rest of the afternoon. We had the excitement of overtaking another team, a difficult manoeuvre considering we had to get all three of our vehicles past the three vehicles of the other team on a winding road with road trains going in both directions.We caught up with another team late in the afternoon and were informed they had heard about the accident with our support vehicle. They kindly offered us hospitality and later in the evening they loaned us a barbecue.

As 5pm approached we found ourselves too far from the next campsite we had marked on our gps system and decided to park on the side of the road. We found an area where we could safely get the car off the road just in time. Even so, the area was covered with bindis and we got several tire punctures in our fragile tires. We were in the middle of no where with a solar car, two sedans and no bedding or shelter or food so some of us went to the nearest town to get some supplies while the rest of us built a camp fire. The others soon returned with bbq meat packs and some chips and drinks. Some of the team visited the “Christine” the Aurora team entry which was 2 kilomeres up the road. They were fantasic, providing us with a bbq and utensil . With the barbecue we borrowed we cooked our dinner.At about 11pm the other vehicles arrived and we learned that our team mates who were in the accident were going to be ok. One had returned to us only a little bruised while the other had some stable injuries from which he would recover and was being held in the hospital overnight. He was scheduled to be flown back to Adelaide the next day.

TAFE SA RAA Kelly Solar Car is still progressing extremely well, averaging 72.6 km/h, and is expected to be close to Port Wakefield today (by 5pm stopping time) the car is at present 5th in the Adventure class and in 13th position overall and is expected to be arriving at Victoria Square, Sat morning (27/10/07) around 11 am, so if you’re free come down and welcome home the team. Check out the podcast of the 891 radio interview last night

Continuum completed the last 280.7 km of the race in 2 hours and 55 minutes with an average speed of 96.7 kilometers. Yesterday we ended with a negative battery pack and today we finished with more than half of a pack remaining. For the Alice Springs to Adelaide half of the race we averaged 89.8 km/hr and finished that section of the race only 16 minutes behind Nuon's time. We started this part of the race with well less than half of a battery pack, while they were given time to fully charge their batteries in Alice Springs. Continuum barely didn't catch up with 3 of the Teams directly in front of us and we should end up in 7th place in Challenge Class. Overall we passed over 25 Teams on our climb up after the accident. Continuum was the 4th Team to cross the finish line.

We've always been looking for a different finish than what we ended up with, but we are ultimately very happy with how Continuum performed. To us, the first half of the race demonstrates that we are the best Team in the world while the second half demonstrates that we have the best car in the world. A first place victory almost comes as an empty victory because it doesn't demonstrate how good the Team really is. Having rallied around the crash we were able to show the world how well we face adversity and how well prepared the Team was. As we crossed the finish line there were 25 friends and family members that had made the trip to Australia to watch the race and cheer us on. We were all happy that we could make them proud by completing this race the way that we did.

The World Solar Challenge has left everyone with a desire to continue racing Continuum. We all look forward to participating in the North American Solar Challenge, where we will have the opportunity to show the world what Continuum is truly capable of. None of this would have been possible without the tremendous support of our sponsors including our Platinum sponsors: The University of Michigan, The University of Michigan College of Engineering, BHP Billiton, Ford, and General Motors. We would like to thank all of them and we hope that we have made you proud to be a part of the University of Michigan Solar Car Team!

Continuum has now reached Adelaide and has successfully completed the 2007 World Solar Challenge! We completed the race in 46 hours and 3 minutes with an average speed of 65.09 km/hr. This puts us at 36 hours and 2 minutes not including the time lost from the accident with an average speed of 83.83 km/hr! Stay tuned for results as the Teams behind us finish the race! As soon as we hear from the race crew in Australia I'll get a more detailed update as well!

What a sensational couple of days. After starting at 8 AM Thur after waiting for other solar cars still under solar power the Hammerhead headed from Alice. After a nervous start with the controller having a little hiccup on the start line the car starts to behave.

We cruise out of Alice a little tentatively but as the day progresses the car keeps going without showing any signs of fault. We have enough Telemetry to know what we are putting to the road but rely on the driver to relay current output from the array. We discover that on a good flat surface the car can travel at about 55kph on solar power alone. We are all pleased.

Toward the end of Thursday we have travelled approx 406km but batteries are low. We camp 45km north of Marla and charge the batteries. Willetton are just down the road but are having battery and array issues. They say they can manage about 70km per day. The Esteban team from Canada drop into the camp and we assist them to pump up tyres they too are having problems and say that they restarted from Alice too. I mention that we are ahead of them. The laugh and wish us well.

Friday morning a few of us drive to Marla to pump up the motor wheel. We can't get the bead to seat with our small pump. We head off 40 min late after serving a short time penalty for stopping late the previous evening.

The day progresses well, the car performs beautifully under the near perfect conditions. We targeted 275km to get to Coober Pedy. We have a forced half hour stop at Cadney Control stop and an unscheduled 18 min stop to change a tyre on the troopy and to repair the windscreen which was dislodged by the windblast from a large oncoming truck. Tom said the experience was interesting!

We pass Coober Pedy at 3PM and decide to drain the Batteries by going hard and then choosing to stop and charge. The car continues to travel exceptionally well and beyond expectations and we manage another 57 km beyond our Target Coober Pedy. We stop at 4:10pm and charge till dusk.

Meanwhile support has head for accommodation at Coober Pedy and when the car crew returns we head out for pizza which I highly recommend.

Friday, October 26, 2007

Here is today's news about Annesley College's EOS Project: the all-schoolgirl team driving their creation - an electric/petrol hybrid Holden Viva - in the Panasonic World Solar Challenge (WSC), an event that began in Darwin last Sunday and finishes in Adelaide on Saturday.The Greenfleet Class showcases fuel efficient technologies and low carbon fuels… practical transport technologies of tomorrow.Annesley is the only all-female team to enter the Challenge. Mortgage Choice is the proud sponsor of their EOS Project, nicknamed 'Lissie'.

TODAY: Friday October 25 – Coober Pedy to Port Augusta

We achieved our ultimate goal!Today was an especially exciting day for us because it was our first day testing Lissie sans electrics, so we could compare her petrol-only performance to her performance as a petrol/electric hybrid.

We're happy to say our little car achieved exactly what we wanted her to as a hybrid! Although the figures won't be confirmed until WSC officials announce the results on Sunday, we've calculated that Lissie uses just over 10 litres of petrol for every 100 kilometres when driven via petrol only whereas when she's switched petrol/electric hybrid mode she uses around 7 litres. That's a 30% reduction in petrol consumption. We're very proud!

Our team travelled approximately 550km from Coober Pedy (where we had time to visit the underground opal museum while we participated in the morning public display) to Port Augusta today, with only driver/navigator swap-over stops and a lunch stop. The roadhouse café staff must not have been informed the WSC would be cruising past because there was only one person in the kitchen. With much running around, she did a great job but I bet she'll sleep well tonight.

The landscape changed a fair bit today. The scenery on either side of the highway transformed from flat red earth with little vegetation to a browner coloured earth that was hilly in spots and quite shrubby, especially as we got close to Port Augusta. It was lovely to see some colour.We had dinner out tonight, wandering into the city centre to eat at a local restaurant, where Meg Craven (the EOS Project surrogate mother) read out a letter written by a long time supporter of Annesley's EOS Project and we swapped stories about our amazing trip.

It is incredible to think our journey is almost over. It has flown by! We are only 298 kilometres from Adelaide, where we should cross our destination check point at around 12:30pm tomorrow and have our final fuel measurements taken.

At 2pm the Greenfleet vehicles will travel to Victoria Square in convoy with a police escort for the Ceremonial finish and public vehicle displays. Once that finishes at 4pm, we will spruce ourselves up for the Civil Reception, being held for all participants at 6pm in the Town Hall. Then, all Greenfleet Technology Class entrants will exhibit their vehicles at the Greenfleet Emerging Transport Technology Conference at Adelaide Convention Centre on 29 and 30 October.

The Panasonic World Solar Challenge has been an adventure of a lifetime in every respect. We are very grateful for the support of our major sponsors, Mortgage Choice and Holden, and for the wonderful efforts and advice of those who travelled with us. The 2007 team has become a close family and will never forget this experience we have been so fortunate to enjoy. Annesley looks forward to its next Challenge!

Contacts…Enquiries to Kristy Sheppard (Mortgage Choice) - 0407 450 860 OR Peter Gubbins (Annesley) - 0422 231 437 OR Meg Craven (Annesley) - 0412 649 460.Please reply to this email with 'unsubscribe' if you choose to not receive this daily update.** Note: Kristy, Peter and Meg are part of the girls' support team and will endeavour to return all calls within 24 hours but there may be occasions when the mobiles are out of range. We appreciate your patience.

The information shown here represents control stop data and shows which vehicles are passed through which control stop. This is not the official time keeping list as certified by our time keeper and does not take any penalties into account. This page does not reflect actual time travelled. Further more, it shows the official departure time of each vehicle from a control and may have data entry errors.

Adelaide

Nuon Solar Team at 2007-10-25 16:54:00

Umicore at 2007-10-26 09:13:00

Aurora Challenge at 2007-10-26 09:54:00

Ashiya University Solar Car Project at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

University of Michigan at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

FH Bochum Solar Car Team at 2007-10-26 11:52:00

National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences at 2007-10-26 11:59:00

The information shown here represents control stop data and shows which vehicles are passed through which control stop. This is not the official time keeping list as certified by our time keeper and does not take any penalties into account. This page does not reflect actual time travelled. Further more, it shows the official departure time of each vehicle from a control and may have data entry errors.

Adelaide

Nuon Solar Team at 2007-10-25 16:54:00

Umicore at 2007-10-26 09:13:00

Aurora Challenge at 2007-10-26 09:54:00

Ashiya University Solar Car Project at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

University of Michigan at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

FH Bochum Solar Car Team at 2007-10-26 11:52:00

National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences at 2007-10-26 11:59:00

The information shown here represents control stop data and shows which vehicles are passed through which control stop. This is not the official time keeping list as certified by our time keeper and does not take any penalties into account. This page does not reflect actual time travelled. Further more, it shows the official departure time of each vehicle from a control and may have data entry errors.

Adelaide

Nuon Solar Team at 2007-10-25 16:54:00

Umicore at 2007-10-26 09:13:00

Aurora Challenge at 2007-10-26 09:54:00

Ashiya University Solar Car Project at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

University of Michigan at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

FH Bochum Solar Car Team at 2007-10-26 11:52:00

National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences at 2007-10-26 11:59:00

The information shown here represents control stop data and shows which vehicles are passed through which control stop. This is not the official time keeping list as certified by our time keeper and does not take any penalties into account. This page does not reflect actual time travelled. Further more, it shows the official departure time of each vehicle from a control and may have data entry errors.

Adelaide

Nuon Solar Team at 2007-10-25 16:54:00

Umicore at 2007-10-26 09:13:00

Aurora Challenge at 2007-10-26 09:54:00

Angle Vale

Ashiya University Solar Car Project at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

University of Michigan at 2007-10-26 11:33:00

FH Bochum Solar Car Team at 2007-10-26 11:52:00

Port Augusta

National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences at 2007-10-26 09:15:00

What is the fastest ever time to travel from Darwin to Adelaide under Solar Power?

29 hours and 24 minutes by Nuna 3 in 2005.

What was the fastest average speed?

102.75 km per hour minutes by Nuna 3 in 2005.

Why was 2007 slower than 2005 when technology is improving all the time?

Two reasons: A speed limit was introduced in the Northern Territory, making the maximum speed 130km per hour, instead of the speeds that were previously possible. Nuna 3 traveled at up 147km per hour in 2005.

Second reason: Nuna 3 had 8 square meters of solar panels. Nuna 4 only has 6 square meters because they participated in different classes.

The information shown here represents control stop data and shows which vehicles are passed through which control stop. This is not the official time keeping list as certified by our time keeper and does not take any penalties into account. This page does not reflect actual time travelled. Further more, it shows the official departure time of each vehicle from a control and may have data entry errors.

Adelaide

Nuon Solar Team at 2007-10-25 16:54:00

Umicore at 2007-10-26 09:13:00

Aurora Challenge at 2007-10-26 09:54:00

Port Augusta

Ashiya University Solar Car Project at 2007-10-25 16:58:00

University of Michigan at 2007-10-26 08:38:00

FH Bochum Solar Car Team at 2007-10-26 08:52:00

National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences at 2007-10-26 09:15:00

The information shown here represents control stop data and shows which vehicles are passed through which control stop. This is not the official time keeping list as certified by our time keeper and does not take any penalties into account. This page does not reflect actual time travelled. Further more, it shows the official departure time of each vehicle from a control and may have data entry errors.

Adelaide

Nuon Solar Team at 2007-10-25 16:54:00

Umicore at 2007-10-26 09:13:00

Angle Vale

Aurora Challenge at 2007-10-26 09:54:00

Port Augusta

Ashiya University Solar Car Project at 2007-10-25 16:58:00

University of Michigan at 2007-10-26 08:38:00

FH Bochum Solar Car Team at 2007-10-26 08:52:00

National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences at 2007-10-26 09:15:00

The information shown here represents control stop data and shows which vehicles are passed through which control stop. This is not the official time keeping list as certified by our time keeper and does not take any penalties into account. This page does not reflect actual time travelled. Further more, it shows the official departure time of each vehicle from a control and may have data entry errors.

Adelaide

Nuon Solar Team at 2007-10-25 16:54:00

Angle Vale

Umicore at 2007-10-26 09:13:00

Aurora Challenge at 2007-10-26 09:54:00

Port Augusta

Ashiya University Solar Car Project at 2007-10-25 16:58:00

University of Michigan at 2007-10-26 08:38:00

FH Bochum Solar Car Team at 2007-10-26 08:52:00

National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences at 2007-10-26 09:15:00

The information shown here represents control stop data and shows which vehicles are passed through which control stop. This is not the official time keeping list as certified by our time keeper and does not take any penalties into account. This page does not reflect actual time travelled. Further more, it shows the official departure time of each vehicle from a control and may have data entry errors.

Angle Vale

Nuon Solar Team at 2007-10-25 16:54:00

Umicore at 2007-10-26 09:13:00

Port Augusta

Aurora Challenge at 2007-10-25 15:57:00

Ashiya University Solar Car Project at 2007-10-25 16:58:00

University of Michigan at 2007-10-26 08:38:00

FH Bochum Solar Car Team at 2007-10-26 08:52:00

National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences at 2007-10-26 09:15:00

Today’s drive took us through the flat dry plains of South Australia past Coober Pedy into Glendambo a good 609 km drive. We averaged a steady 80km/hr and had two control stops, the first was at Cadney where we briefly met two of the Canadian teams, Calgary ahead of us and Blue Sky from Toronto behind us. The second control stop, Glendambo, we reached at 4:45 and camped once again nearby. After a rather uneventful day we finished off the afternoon with two separate tyre changes on the side of the road that took eight and seven minutes respectively. Anthony and I spent over fourty minutes trying to change tyres in the back seat of the Rodeo on the road and were feeling rather pleased with ourselves until we were told the teams previous tyre changer took only ten minutes.

Despite the fact that Yael noticed both flat tyres early by the time we got the car off the road we had an impressive looking tyre to put on the wall shredded all the way around. Once the rim had had a quick sand it was as good as new and we are ready to go for what should be our last day on the road with the solar car. If all things go well we will make it to the final Adelaide control stop by four thirty and come through North Adelaide down King William Rd to be in Victoria Square by 5:30. If you are around Adelaide come down and look at all the cars that will be displayed in Victoria Square for the weekend.

Apologies for the sporadic nature of the web updates, it corresponds predominantly to limited phone coverage along with your regular updater abandoning her post to get her hands dirty and assist with wheel and tire changes. As we come nearer to Adelaide and reception improves we shall endeavour to keep you informed more regularly.

As today’s departure was not until 1:30 we had a leisurely morning woken by Nuna’s support vehicle playing the ‘Skippy” theme song and “Land Down Under” from the speaker mounted on its roof. The weather was beautiful and sunny enabling the battery to be fully charged by midday while the team stocked up on food, fuel and showering and attended to the odd electrical issues.

With a full battery pack, Smithy drove a cracking pace in Sunswift which maintained our place and we arrived at five o’clock without any incident to camp in a little rise in sight of the South Australian border. Setting up the tilter to catch the last light of the day has become routine and was followed by Anthony’s nightly tire changes. The mood of the evening was light and cheerful and Ken took out his bagpipes that proved entertaining for all.

Nuna4 has crossed the finish line first in the 2007 Panasonic World Solar Challenge. At 16:54:00 Nuna4 crossed the time finish line, crossing the Australian continent in 4 days at an average speed around 91 km/hr.

After a partial rest day in Alice Springs, Nuna experienced a hard 3rd day of racing. After wearing 4 left tires, the team decided to completely rebuild the left suspension at the end of the racing day.

It obviously paid off, as the clear skies of our camp south of Coober Pedy in the naked and truly barren outback contributed to spectacularly clear skies. A extremely chilly night apparently did not deter the sun, as static charging during sunset and sunrise were more than 1.5 times better than expected. This contributed to Nuna's spectacular finishing day, consistently driving at or near the 110 km/hr speed limit, and finishing off the day in Nuna style. Hard crosswinds did cause another flat tire, but the results do not lie, as we finished far ahead of our nearest rivals.

The team is extremely happy with our result, and this blog is being written as we are anxious to get out on the Adelaide nightlife to celebrate our latest victory!!!

World Solar Challenge Website

The Challenge: Design and build a car capable of crossing the vast and imposing continent of Australia using only sunlight as fuel and to prove it, in the spirit of friendly competition against others with the same goal.

This BLOG updates as teams publish their contributions around the world.